Microsoft, Esterel and Geensys form Embedded Alliance

At the second French/German Embedded Systems Symposium held this week at Bercy in Paris, France, Microsoft, Esterel Technologies, and Geensys have taken a leadership role in helping advance the development of technologies and methods in the embedded industries of France and Germany. In order to keep European system and software development engineering in a leadership position, the three companies have agreed to offer a unique set of software development tools at either free or extremely low prices to a network of selected universities and academic institutions offering embedded systems development programs, following the recommendations of the Embedded Systems Committee of Syntec Informatique at this event. Within the embedded software development industry, Microsoft provides MSDN Academic Alliance, formerly known as MSDN AA, providing the easiest and most inexpensive way for universities to make the Microsoft software available in labs, classrooms, and on student PCs. It is totally free for students. This membership enables STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) departments to outfit their machines with the latest Microsoft development tools, operating systems, server software, documentation, and technical references (including embedded technology). In addition, students will have complete access to these tools and references for use on their personal computers. The object of the Embedded Development competition is according to Microsoft to unleash students' creativity in an effort to change the world into a better place. The Embedded Development Competition challenges students from everywhere in the world to go beyond the PC desktop and work in both hardware and software to build an embedded solution using Windows Embedded CE 6.0 R2 and the provided embedded platform.